I found this game in a
combination games box (see below), but I am not really sure if it belongs there.
This has happened to me before (here
is another example). In this case, the combination box was quite uncomplete
and, on the other hand, contained some games and parts that obviously had been
added later.

The rules mention "il
nostro giro d'Italia confezionato in scatola", so it is possible that there is
another version of the game.

This board measures 66
x 49 cms.

Technically, this is
not a race game. The winner is not the first player to reach the last square of
the board (or to reach a given number of points) but the player with most points
collected when all the players have reached the end of the board. However, it is
a game of pure luck (no strategy involved, no decisions taken), which is why I
am including it in the games-of-goose section.

Dating this game is an
interesting cycling history exercise. Look at the six riders pictured. Of course
Bartali and Coppi are obvious choices. But who are the other four?

a) Vito Ortelli is
probably the next best known cyclist in the list, but very far from Coppi and
Bartali. By the way, he is also featured in
this other game. (Coppi
and Bartali also are, of course, but for Ortelli it is an impressive result to
be featured in two games). Vito Ortelli was a professional cyclist between 1940
and 1952. His best results were between 1946 and 1948. He was third in the final
overall standings of the 1946 Giro d'Italia, in which he wore the maglia rosa
during 5 days. He won the Italian national championship in 1948.

b) Aldo Ronconi was
also a professional cyclist between 1940 and 1952. His best results were in the
1946 and 1947 seasons. In 1946 he won the Italian national championship, one Giro
d'Italia stage and was 5th in the final overall standings.

c) Renzo Zanazzi had a
shorter career than Ortelli or Ronconi. He was a professional cyclist between
1946 and 1952. Again, he had good results during 1946 and 1947: one stage in
the Giro in 1946, two stages (and three days in maglia rosa) in 1947. He is
considered one of the best early post-war Italian sprinters, but there were
probably more important riders that could have been featured in this game.

d) Italo Astolfi is
even a weirder choice for a Giro d'Italia game. He was 7 times Italian national
track champion between 1941 and 1950 but I am not really sure if he ever took
part in the Giro.

With these data in mind,
it is obvious that the game was not made before 1946.

However, maybe more
important than the riders featured in the game are the riders not featured. I do
not mean Oreste Conte or Adolfo Leoni (who also had good results in
the second part of the 1940s, probably better than Zanazzi's) but of Fiorenzo
Magni, of course. Magni was the third most important Italian rider in the post-war
years, though he was somewhat younger that the riders featured in this game. He
won his first the Giro d'Italia in 1948 (he also won in 1951 and 1955, among
many other races), and he had a superstar status only second to Coppi and
Bartali.

That is why this game
can be safely dated as being older than the Giro of 1948.

PS: If I had
examined the board when I wrote the paragraphs above, it would have saved me
some work. The game follows the stages of the Giro of 1948... It can be assumed
that it IS from 1948.

This is the combination
games box where I found this game. It does not have much information, nor was a
list of games included. It contained some items that were obviously added later
(as a Stella game of goose, some 1970s cars, and an MB 1970s catalogue...) but
of course some (probably most) items must be original.

Some
of the boards included in the box. The game of goose you see
is by Cartoccino too. (The one by Stella is not shown on
this picture). The smaller boards are unbranded.